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Monday, February 3, 2014

Another bird alert

I went out this afternoon on an errand that involved my camera. As always, I had to stop in the drive and admire my lovely little flying pigs. Eventually I realized I had a camera and they were about their regular business up there because I stop in that driveway every morning and smile over the birds. "Just the old lady in the car," they probably call from branch to branch. I got 'em with my camera! I may do this again, with the door wide open and both feet firmly on the ground. Craning from behind the steering wheel is not the best shooting position.

There are four bird feeders hanging from the oak tree. This feeder holds a large block of safflower, protected by that overhang. At the time of shooting, a red-headed woodpecker was busy on the other side. The safflower blocks last about six weeks. Last time we put in a cylinder of fruits, nuts and berries those little fiends offed in about a week. I love the little darlings, but I want more for my twenty dollar bill.

This is the finch feeder of Nyjer thistle seed. It is not native, but comes from Ethiopia or thereabout. Also not inexpensive; I hope I am supporting at least one village. This feeder is brilliant. It is a wire mesh tube and a dozen finch can and do frequent it at once without dispute. If there is room to land they do not need to boost another finch off; they just get down to business and eat a lot of thistle seed.

This is the "big" bird feeder. Holds a lot! Ten or twelve cups of the past middle expensive stuff. Big, oily black sunflower seeds, peanuts, lots of goodies. This feeder is also genius. The perch is too high for bigger birds to use the feeding holes. I don't have anything against blue jays, past their meanness; they can hang out with the doves and the squirrels, down below. About the squirrels--if they hang off the perch, or slide down to the bottom grey collar, all the feeder holes close. Nananananah.

This is the "little" bird feeder. It's where we put the big bucks feed. It treats squirrels with the same disdain as the big bird feeder. I hope some engineer is collecting royalties. The empty frame is another holder for molded bells. We've run out of those at present. That's a chickadee on the feeder.

And leaving the feeder. I don't always know what I'm shooting; the "image stabilization" puts a delay between depressing the shutter and taking the shot. Not too fond of that. And the lack of a viewfinder. I dropped the camera and broke the flash recently. There may be a new camera in my future. It could have a lot more zoom, as well as a view finder.I also noticed everything half empty at noon, so I put the birds' best friends on the job when they came in from school. They announced the bottom of the big and little bird feeder pails hove into view, but the thistle pail is still half full, gramma.So, Laura and I made a seed run to the wild flying pigs, unlimited store after supper and before it snows another eight to twelve inches tomorrow. We refilled the pails for the little darlings, and put bells in the empty frames.

Oh my gosh with the 8-12 more inches of snow? Such cute birds that come to eat at your place and interesting bird feeders for them. I like the one that discourages the squirrels! I might have said this before but when we lived in Santa Fe, we had bird feeders and I came to notice that when the birds were abundant eating, within a few days or often the next day we would have a winter storm. Almost like they were planning ahead. I learned to somewhat predict the weather by who was coming to feed.

Dear Joanne, saw your worthy goal on Tom's site and support it - which is easy, because I like your posts! I have one birdfeeder on the balcony - at the moment there come many many sparrows (all sparrows on the Red Protective List seem to live here) and tits - and because it is so cold, they munch away the food quickly.

My husband is the bird feeder and sometimes our yard that looks like a scene from the movie, The Birds. It can get expensive feeding them all as he fills up numerous feeders every day.

The other day we saw a swarm of Robbins. They come to eat the berries on the trees. Unfortunately, the trees are snow covered and by the forecasts, will remain so with two more storms coming our way. The Robbins arrived way too early.

We had to give up on bird feeders.In the winter the raccoons run off with them,in the summer the bears steal them. The seed is on the ground,those who are hungry enough risk cold feet...those who prefer their comfort, don't visit.Jane x

It's lovely to see your feeders and the birds -- it brings back many happy memories of my parents -- who spent much time and money seeing that his feathered friends were well fed and watered during the cold New England winters...

We're doing our best to keep our two feeders full. Flying pigs is a good name for them. I wouldn't mind so much if they actually ate it all. The wrens make occasional visits to the tea cup which I keep filled with striped sunflower seeds. They toss those things left and right and don't eat a single one. When it gets empty, the seed eaters that frequent it will perch on it and peer in the window giving me the stink eye. The chickadees will chirp at me.

Dear Joanne, where do you live that you are getting so much snow. Here in western Missouri we get so little, but yesterday the snowfall broke the record. The official stat was 9 inches, but I measured 11 on my driveway. I went out to shovel three times yesterday and then again this morning. But a generous and kind neighbor had her snowblower out, doing her drive, and came over, when I was half done and finished it for me. I hope to make her some yeast bread or quick bread but I'm out of the ingredients I need and the city snowplow hasn't done the street and so I probably won't get out and about until tomorrow. Then we are expecting snow again on Friday and Saturday. This is quite unusual here.

I used to feed the birds, up in Minnesota, and when I moved here I did it sporadically--which is not good for the birds. This winter I've been remiss, so your posting is a good reminder for me. Thank you. peace.